The Royal Bank of Scotland is close to inking the sale of a 30,000 m2 office portfolio in northern Italy for around €80 mln, PropertyEU has learned.

The Royal Bank of Scotland is close to inking the sale of a 30,000 m2 office portfolio in northern Italy for around €80 mln, PropertyEU has learned.

The UK lender had hired CBRE late last year to market the buildings formerly owned by Italian entrepreneur Luigi Zunino, the founder and former owner of troubled Milan-based developer Risanamento. They were initially marketed with a guide price of €100 mln.

RBS took back control of the buildings in 2011.

The package includes one building at Corso Vittorio Emanuele, one at Galleria Passerella in the city centre of Milan as well as a couple of smaller asset in Segrate and in Turin.

The portfolio was marketed among a wide range of investors, including US opportunistic players such as Blackstone, GWM and Cerberus. The transaction is scheduled to close in the second half of 2015.

Blackstone has been very active in Italy in recent monthd. In December, the US private equity group emerged as the buyer of the headquarters of La Nazione in Florence while PropertyEU understands it is also the buyer of a portfolio of government-let office buildings from Fondi Immobili Pubblici, a closed-end fund managed by Investire Immobiliare Sgr, for about €160 mln.